Alex scanned the island once more, desperate to see Lani or Samheed. “It’s going to be dark soon. Meghan’s freezing’the water here is much colder than it is at Artimé. I don’t know if she’s injured more than just the neck thing, or what. She’s . . . She won’t wake up.”
Simber nodded and waited.
“So . . . you’re sure there’s no sign of Sam and Lani?” Alex knew, of course, that Simber wouldn’t have lied about it. He just had to get himself to accept that his friends were missing . . . and quite possibly worse off than Meghan. He couldn’t bear to take it all in.
“I’m sorrry. No sign. No scent. And, of courrrse, no sound.”
Alex looked down at Meghan. “We need to leave them here . . . don’t we.” It wasn’t really a question.
Simber’s eyes softened. “Yes, Alex.”
Alex blew out a breath and nodded. “Okay.” That was the help he needed. “We need to save the one we know we can save.” Hurriedly he grabbed more dry towels from the stack he’d found and began rewrapping Meghan in them.
“That’s rrright.”
Alex looked at the almost-setting sun, and then peered in the direction of Artimé. His heart pounded and he sat upright, leaning forward, squinting and worrying. “I can’t see home.”
“I can,” Simber said. “We’ll go togetherrr, as always.”
Alex gave one last fleeting glance over his shoulder at the silent island, and then released the anchor spell and situated himself behind the wheel of the boat, straining his eyes to read the instructions in the dimming light. He started the boat and looked up at Simber. “Lead the way. Full speed.”
“If we hurrry, we’ll make it by darrrk,” Simber said. He looked down at Alex. “I won’t leave you.”
Alex nodded. With a powerful flap, Simber rose and headed east toward home.
“Hang on, Meg,” Alex whispered as he powered the boat to full speed. “You’ll be safe soon.” He clenched his hands around the steering wheel and followed Simber. He didn’t look back again.
The Dark and Quiet Place
After the screaming came the silence, and then the burning eye drops, which were not nearly as bad as the thorny necklace surgery, but the drops still stung ferociously and made Lani blind. She ached everywhere. They brought her somewhere cool and dry, and left her there, free of ropes or tethers. But it didn’t matter. She didn’t feel like moving.
She had heard Samheed’s cries for a while not far away, but she was too weak, too blind to even attempt to find him. And then Sam, like Meghan, and like herself, had gone silent without warning when the sharp device was connected in place. There was nothing to be heard after that.
Later she felt a slight breeze, as if someone or something moved past her, and she swung her arms out weakly, but they didn’t connect with anything but air. She crawled around, shaking with pain and weakness and fear, until the panic inside her finally shuddered its way out of her body. But no one who cared would ever see it.
Lani could do nothing but sit in this cave. She could see nothing but a sheet of black. And she couldn’t hear anything at all’no noise transmitted anywhere on the island. Not through voice, or friction, or shuffle of feet.
Not even through dripping tears or cracking hearts.
Heart Attack
Aaron went back to worrying over the weapons on the desk in Haluki’s office, having no stomach for food now. He sat in Haluki’s chair, elbows on the desk and face in his hands. He was in over his head and he knew it. He had four dozen fighters at most . . . at most! How could they possibly prevail against hundreds of Artiméans, even if the Restorers did have a little magic? Artimé had more. They always had more.
Besides that, he was not playing it out right at all. What was he doing, getting Eva so mad at him? But he could feel it’the control he so desperately desired, flitting just out of his grasp, and it made him crazy. He should just call the whole thing off. “It’s too soon,” he muttered, not for the first time that evening. He lifted his head and stared at the measly weaponry in front of him. And then he heard a noise.
When the closet on the wall across from him rattled, and the doors unlatched, he first thought that his stressed-out mind was playing tricks on him. But then the doors opened further, and before Aaron could make a sound Mr. Today emerged from the closet into the office through the enormous glass tube.
Mr. Today took a few steps before he noticed the strange weapons strewn over the top of Gunnar’s desk, and then he looked up and saw Aaron slowly rising to his feet.
They stood stock-still, both completely startled, facing each other just a few feet apart. Neither moved a muscle, and thoughts flooded both of their minds.
Mr. Today’s first instinct was to warn his daughter. But before he could do anything to stop Claire from coming through the tube, Aaron Stowe jerked out his arm and grabbed a handful of heart attack components from the desk.
Without hesitation, Mr. Today whipped a pen from his robe pocket and shot a blinding highlighter spell into Aaron’s eyes. But Aaron, unfazed and spurred on by Eva Fathom’s dare, didn’t need his eyes to know where the mage was. As he reeled backward, he flung all of the components at once toward the man, shouting, “Heart attack!”
Five clay hearts sprouted wings and flew at Mr. Today. The old mage tried to dodge them, but the components had locked in on their target. They slammed into his chest, knocking the mage to the floor as they found their mark.
Shocked by the impact, Mr. Today gasped and clutched his robe. The pain seared through him, from his chest outward in all directions, stopping his breath. He closed his eyes, sending one last message as the heart attack spells stabbed deep into him, five times the power and intensity of one. He writhed on the floor, shaking.
Aaron, blinded, called out to his team, unsure what had happened. “Help!” he called out. “I can’t see!”
A second later Aaron heard another noise from the cabinet. “Help!” he cried out again. “They’re attacking!” His housemates came thundering in. By the time Claire Morning stepped out of the closet and saw her father on the floor, Mr. Today had stopped shaking and lay completely still.
Crawledge and Bethesda seized Claire, and Liam clamped his hand over her mouth. He grabbed a rusty knife from the desk and held it to her throat. “Not one word,” he said.
Everyone stood transfixed by the strange, horrific situation as one by one they realized what Aaron had just done.
“What’s happening?” Aaron called out anxiously, but then his sight miraculously cleared. He scrambled to his feet, ready to attack, but everyone’s attention was diverted to the closet, where the strange glass tube faded away before the Restorers’ eyes.
From the Vast Ocean
Alex never loosened his grip on the wheel, and he urged the boat on faster and faster. Simber stayed steady, ahead and to the right, so he could look over his shoulder now and then and make sure Alex was okay.
And Alex kept looking down at Meghan, glad she was shielded from the wind, hoping she was still alive, still hanging on.
Regret and fear pounded through his body in waves. He wished he’d stopped his friends. He wished he’d known what they were about to do. How foolish! What were they thinking? But he remembered his first glance at the beautiful island, thinking how serene and lovely it appeared. “Why’d you do it, Meg?” he asked, knowing she couldn’t hear him.
It was what he couldn’t say that crushed him. He couldn’t even think it, it was too horrible to imagine. Lani.
And Samheed, too, but it was different with Lani. She was his . . . sort of . . . oh, this was all so horrible. He had to stop thinking about it. He glanced at their component vests, folded neatly on the seat next to him, the top one fluttering slightly whenever a gust of wind slipped under it. They’d had no protection. Why on earth would they take their vests off? They were smarter than that! Alex didn’t understand it.
And now he and Simber had left them there . . . wherever they were. Underground in a hole?
That was crazy.
Maybe he should have had Simber carry Meghan and him home, and left the boat for Sam and Lani, just in case. He glanced over his shoulder and bit his lip, wishing he’d thought of that. Maybe they should turn back. But they were almost home now. In the dim light Alex could see the mansion all lit up. It was beautiful from this angle. He’d never noticed it like this before.
By the time they grew close to Artimé, Alex had decided it. He’d drop Meghan off in care of the nurses, and then he and Simber would go back to the island and leave the boat for Samheed and Lani, just in case. He doubted the natives of that island could know how to dismantle the anchor spell, so there was little worry of it being stolen. What if Samheed and Lani had watched him and Simber leave with the boat, and they’d been unable to make a sound, like Meghan? It tore Alex apart to think about it. He cursed the boat for not going faster, and Simber flapped onward, never tiring. Always there, faithfully at Alex’s side.
Until suddenly, he wasn’t.
Without warning the boat sputtered loudly and stopped running. Alex and Meghan pitched forward, Alex hitting the windshield and cutting his lip open, Meghan slamming lifelessly into a seat and stopping there. As he was about to use the magical verbal component to get the boat started again, he noticed, out of the corner of his eye, Simber frozen mid-flap in the air. The giant cat tipped forward sharply and began falling, falling, falling. “Simber!” Alex yelled, but the giant stone statue didn’t respond. “Simber!”
Simber slammed face-first into the water with an enormous splash, sending a giant wave that nearly capsized the boat. Alex and Meghan flew out over the side like weightless rag dolls being tossed across a room, and plunged headlong into the sea. When Alex surfaced, coughing and sputtering, he saw the tip of Simber’s tail disappearing under the water. “Simber!” Alex cried out again. But he had no time to think about Simber now. He twisted in the water, looking frantically in all directions.
“Meghan!” he screamed.
She was nowhere to be found.
Gone
Aaron watched in amazement, and then came to his senses. He grabbed a pistol from the table and pointed it at Claire Morning. “If you speak, you will die,” he said.
Ms. Morning couldn’t make a sound. She didn’t even look at Aaron. She could only stare at the body of her father, crumpled and unmoving on the floor. He looked so helpless.
Keeping the gun trained on Claire, Aaron turned back to Mr. Today. He stepped carefully over to the mage and nudged him with his foot. The magician didn’t respond.
“Is he dead?” Bethesda asked. “What did you do to him?”
“Quiet,” Aaron barked. His heart raced. Had he killed Mr. Today? Had it really been so easy? He turned to Crawledge and Bethesda. “Take her to the pantry and lock her up. Bar the door. Liam, give her a little something to help her remember not to give us any trouble.”
Liam’s eyes widened. “Like what?”
Aaron shoved his hands into his pockets to keep them from trembling. “Just . . . whatever. Threaten her. Think of something! I don’t care.”
Claire turned her head back to Liam now, her eyes filled with hatred and unshed tears. She glared at him, and he couldn’t look at her.
“Come on,” Liam said roughly. He picked his way over Mr. Today and around furniture and led them to the kitchen pantry, Claire struggling slightly, but not enough to get herself shot. “Just throw her in there,” he mumbled. “I need to help Aaron with the body.”
Crawledge and Bethesda shoved Claire into the space under the bottom shelf, tied her wrists and ankles, stuffed a dusty cloth in her mouth, and closed the door. When they had secured the pantry, and the sounds of their voices grew distant, Claire Morning closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wall.
The Restorers
nce Eva had delivered the false message, Gondoleery Rattrapp wasted no time. She’d been waiting weeks for this moment, and her teams and weapons were ready. They slithered toward Quill, staying in whatever late afternoon shadows they could find along the way. They arrived at dusk. Gondoleery tried to release the spell on the gate, but it didn’t work. She tried again, and then realized it must be a very strong spell’more powerful than she was at the moment.
“We’ll have to break it down,” she said. But first she gathered her troops around her to go over the plan one last time. They were all in agreement to wait until the moon was high overhead so they could have some advantage of light when the Artiméans came pouring out of the mansion to fight.
But before the plan could be enacted, a strange cry rose up from inside Artimé. Gondoleery and her team could hear it, plain as day. As far as she knew, that had never happened before’Artimé had a sound barrier around it, which had helped to keep it from being discovered all those years. But now they could hear people shrieking and crying out. Something chaotic had clearly happened. And then the gate clicked and popped open an inch.
Gondoleery was happy to take advantage of that.
“Ready?” she whispered harshly. “Charge!” She opened the gate and her team streamed in behind her. But it wasn’t long before they were all nearly trampled or swept up by the crowd of people that flooded out of Artimé.
“After them!” Gondoleery cried. She wasn’t pleased that no one seemed to even notice her ferocious team amid all the chaos. Still, they managed to take down a few straggling Unwanteds as they chased after them.
Out in the road around Quill, the Artiméans, realizing they were under attack, struggled to pull themselves together. Soon they began to fight back. Gondoleery flinched as an Artiméan sent a rubber sphere flying toward her, hitting her in the shoulder.
But nothing happened. The spell component bounced harmlessly to the ground and rolled in the dirt. As the look of surprise came over the face of the Unwanted who’d thrown it, Gondoleery picked up the ball and stared at it, then shoved it in her pocket. There was no time to ponder this latest development now. She had a battle to win.
To the Depths of Despair
Alex sucked in a breath and dove down, eyes wide open, looking for any flash of color, any sign of Meghan. It was dark down there, and mentally he scrambled for all of the possible spells he could use to help him in a situation like this, but he could think of none. Even his origami dragons would be of no use now to light up the night, for they were a sopping wet mess in his component vest pocket.
Desperately he searched for Meghan, waving his hands around through the water. His lungs felt like they were going to burst. He came up for air and whipped his head around, looking for any sign of her, but there was nothing. Then down he went again. Please! he screamed in his mind, thinking of Lani and Samheed. I can’t lose everyone.
That thought nearly made him break apart, but it also gave him the strength to dive deeper, to search harder. He surfaced once more, panting, and looked everywhere. Only the boat, upright again and drifting toward the shore, was visible. He knew there was no time to waste.
He sucked in an enormous breath and down he went a third time, deeper, farther, until his ears ached and popped. He strained to reach anything he could touch in the murky water. Just when he was about to give up he kicked his feet, and his toes got tangled up in something.
It was hair.
He turned sharply and reached for her hair, grasping it with his hand, and yanked as hard as he could, rushing, kicking, with all of his might, pulling her up alongside him and then pushing her above him to the surface. When they broke through, Alex gasped and sucked in air, flipping on his back and holding Meghan tightly to his chest, trying to float, and unable to do another thing until he had replenished his oxygen stores.
He squeezed Meghan’s stomach and started kicking toward the shore. “Breathe!” he cried. And then, between ragged breaths, he chanted to keep himself focused. “Breathe. Please breathe.”
Meghan choked and silently coughed up water. She took a raking breath in and coughed some more.
“Come on,” Alex said. “
Breathe! That’s it!”
Meghan struggled. The sharp thorns around her neck cut into Alex’s chest like lethal scatterclips hitting their mark, but he couldn’t do anything to adjust his pain or hers right now. Waves constantly washed over their faces, causing them to feel like they were drowning over and over again.
“Come on, now,” Alex said again, barely whispering. “We’re going to make it. We’re going to make it.” He put everything he had into getting through the next second, and the next, and the next.
It took almost an hour to reach the shore of Artimé. When Alex could touch the bottom, he stumbled, dragged Meghan to the measure of sand, and collapsed. They rested there for several minutes in the dark, Alex just feeling the solid wet earth beneath him, Meghan not feeling anything at all. Alex didn’t let go of her. The only way he knew she was alive was by feeling her stomach rise and fall beneath his arm.
Finally, when he was able, he called out in a hoarse voice. “Help’anyone? Is anyone out here?”
No one answered.
No one? On a beautiful evening like this? Carefully he rolled Meghan off of him and staggered to his feet, his legs wobbly and his arms feeling like seaweed. He picked up Meghan under her arms and walked backward, dragging her up the shore, and then when he could go no farther, he set her down gently and turned toward the mansion to go and find help.
But there was no mansion there.
There was no mansion, no trees, no water fountains, no beautiful colors. No happy little creatures wandering about. No brightly lit lawn to sit on.
There was only a gray shack, sitting on a slab of broken cement. Burned-looking weeds grew out of the cracks. A stark wall stood in the distance, with a gate standing open. And strewn across the cement were the lifeless bodies of squirrelicorns and beavops and owlbats.